Desperate Livin’ – S/T E.P. 7″

This extremely hard to find piece of plastic was posted on Girls from Tahiti about one and a half years ago, but as Paul has removed all mp3’s to his old postings I thought it was about time to make a repost of it.

It took me years and years before I actually saw a copy of this one for sale, and I’ve seen a total of 5 copies (including my copy) of it for sale since I first heard of it’s existans about 10 years ago. Anyway, when I tried to figure out what to write in this post I started to think about which Swedish records I’ve had a hard time to track down, as well as the price of them today. My conclusion so far is that the more obscure and expensive ones are more often from the 80’s than the 70’s. Sure, there are of course a bunch of pricey ones from the 70’s as well, like the Kriminella Gitarrer’s Vardad Klädsel, the first P.F. Command0, Ebba Gron’s Anti Rock on Efel, Gollywog, the first Shit Kids and Bad Boo Band’s extremely expensive first 7″, but compared to all the ones from the early 80’s like the first and second TST, Shas, Vicious Visions, both Bizex-B’s LP’s , 57 Kez, Homy Hogs’ early releases, WC, Kessler Jugend GMBH, Von Gam, Sotlimpa’s EP, Tuppjukk, the Aminne Punk Fiesta compilation etc, plus all the early Swedish HC releases from Anti-Cimex, Skitslickers, Headcleaners, Missbrukarna, Absurd and so on.

I’m not saying that that’s a fact, and I’m not even sure that I believe in it myself tomorrow, but none the less I have thought a bit about why it might be like this, and I think it’s because in the early 80’s punk was dead according to the news papers. And maybe, just maybe some more trendy lordagspunkare bought it and moved on to the next thing. If it’s so, then that could explain why more records from the second century of punk is more often pressed in smaller quantities (as the bands didn’t expect to sell as many records). While most records from the 70’s are pressed in 500 copies or more in Sweden, the “newer” bands were more fond of pressing 300 copies or less.

Desperate Livin’s EP was released in 1981, and came pretty close to proto hardcore in their sound, if it’s OK to call a band proto hardcore in the middle of the big HC wave that started to sweep over the world that year. Killer amazing fantastic record no matter what. Melodic yet aggressive with a great production and better than average musicians.

I’ve had this one for some time now, and didn’t see that it came with a lyric sheet until a few days ago when I saw a copy for sale that had it. I talked to a friend who bought it pretty recent and asked if he could scan the insert for me, if he had it. He was pretty unsure if it was included in his copy, but took a look and said he had it. The day after I took a closer look at my copy and saw that I had the insert as well. Apparently I never looked in the sleeve. Glad it’s included though as I can finally hear what they’re singing!

16 Responses to Desperate Livin’ – S/T E.P. 7″

No way out is really interesting. They should have carried on in that direction. The great shame with so many of these bands is the so-called “discography” – they do 2-4 tracks, before a Yoko Spudgeon broke them all up, or the lead singer went off to university in another town (and is now the production manager in a leading paper clip factory in Upsala) or whatever. It’s as if Van Gough painted 3 pictures, and then thought: fuck this I’m going to make clogs for a living.

Sorry Tim, but the singer is now an associate professor in medical psychology and has written books about stress. I think he still lives in Stockholm, even if Uppsala ain’t too far away… He’s sort of famous and appears here and there when media wants someone to talk about stress.

There is a certain irony in this, is there not? He makes a noisy punk rock record called “no way out” about life being a nightmare, having his brain for sale, and being locked in fridge and then he becomes a famous Swedish “anti-stress” guru.

Wow this is great thanks for posting! I thought No Way Out was the weakest track on here… it reminded me of a less unique “Repetition” by the Fall… still decent tho… the other songs on the other hand were totally killer especially Gevar

I agree with proto hardcore. Thanks for another genre to remember. Someone tried to sell a copy for like 700 bucks on e-bay. Not to successful I guess. Anyhow – another great seven (my wife – a teacher – told me to write number one to twelve) inch.
Any postings on this bands including live performances they done it inertesting. BTW. This is a 300 bucks seven inch. No more!

As you are posting Micke – are there any more recordings with Desperate Livin’???
BTW – Looking at my stupid post late midnight in May after 10 pints of ale. Must stop to write then. Thanks again for posting! I got the record by the other day. It was not cheap but worth every buck.